A little about:
Reid Garrett Hoffman, 53, is an American technology entrepreneur, investor and author.
Hoffman co-founded LinkedIn in 2003 and was its CEO.
LinkedIn is a business-focused social media platform that is probably familiar to many people in business and beyond.
His current position in the industry is as a partner at venture capital firm Greylock Partners. He also hosts a podcast called Masters of Scale, which explores interesting perspectives on business. https://open.spotify.com/show/1bJRgaFZHuzifad4IAApFR?si=2n0GUtNaRtajkRQJFJQjpg
Hoffman and LinkedIn made a deal with Microsoft on 13 June 2016, when Microsoft bought LinkedIn for $26.2 billion. At the time it was Microsoft’s largest acquisition.
Reid Hoffman made around $2.8 billion from the sale, as he was a majority owner of LinkedIn at the time.
A little about Hoffman’s connection to Peter Thiel:
They have been friends for over 30 years, though they are on opposite sides politically.
Hoffman was also part of PayPal.
When Facebook was looking to expand, Hoffman called Thiel and asked him to join a meeting with Mark Zuckerberg after Sean Parker suggested it to Hoffman. They ended up becoming Facebook’s first investors.
A little about:
Sean Parker, 40, is an American entrepreneur and philanthropist. He is best known for co-founding Napster, one of the first large and “illegal” file-sharing services, and for being Facebook’s first president. He also co-founded Plaxo, Causes, Airtime.com and Brigade, an online platform for civic engagement.
Parker held a 4% stake in Facebook when the company went public in 2012, worth $3.4 billion at the time. The same stake would be worth more than $20 billion today.
In 2010, Sean Parker of Founders Fund reportedly invested $15–30 million in Spotify for a 5% stake. He sat on Spotify’s board until 2017 and negotiated on Spotify’s behalf for its US launch. After extensive negotiations with Warner Music and Universal Music, an agreement was reached and Spotify announced its US launch in July 2011.
Sean Parker and Peter Thiel worked closely together at Founders Fund.
Parker joined Founders Fund in 2006 and was a general partner there for about eight years.
In 2015 he donated $600 million to establish the Parker Foundation, which focuses on supporting organisations and businesses in science, global health and civic engagement.
These days he focuses on philanthropy and his own projects. He also works on economic challenges in the United States.
Two eccentric American billionaires, both influential in the American and perhaps global technology market. They have left their mark by establishing or helping to found companies that will be remembered for what LinkedIn did for business, connectivity and collaboration,
And what Napster did for sharing music: showing the world that the time had come for changes in where and how we listen. It became easier and cheaper than a CD costing more than 100 Norwegian kroner for around 15 songs. Napster paved the way for Spotify, which has proved a useful part of everyday life.
